USES & GRATIFICATIONS RESEARCH

Research Question: What do people do with the media?

• U & G arose originally in the 1940s and underwent a revival in the 1970s and 1980s.
• The approach springs from a functionalist paradigm in the social sciences: What function do media serve in people's lives?

Fulfilling Needs and Desires

• It presents the use of media in terms of the gratification of social or psychological needs of the individual.
• Gratifications can be obtained from:
  • Medium's content (e.g. watching a specific program ie. General Hospital)
  • Familiarity with a genre within the medium (e.g. watching soap operas)
  • General exposure to the medium (e.g. watching TV)
  • Social context in which it is used (e.g. watching TV with the family/friends).

Motivation: How are people motivated to use media? Assumption was the motivations you hold effects how you interpret media.

Methods: Interview & surveys; self-reporting measures of media use; ethnographic research.

Results

• Research has shown the influence of mood on media choice:
  • boredom encourages the choice of exciting content
  • stress encourages a choice of relaxing content
• The same TV program may gratify different needs for different individuals.

Common Reasons Given for Media Use (Blumler and Katz, 1974)

1. Information/Surveillance
2. Personal Identity
3. Integration and Social Interaction/Personal Relationships
4. Entertainment/Diversion

Reasons Observed in Ethnographic Research - Social Uses of Television

1. Structural

• Environmental
• Regulative

2. Relational

• Communication Facilitation
• Affiliation/Avoidance
• Social Learning
• Competence/Dominance

Specific Research - Watching Quiz Shows

Self-Rating Appeal

• I can compare myself with the experts
• I like to imagine that I am on the program and doing well
• I feel pleased that the side I favor has actually won
• I am reminded of when I was in school
• I laugh at the contestants' mistakes

Basis for Social Interaction

• I look forward to talking about it with others
• I like competing with other people watching with me
• I like working together with the family on the answers
• The children get a lot out of it
• It brings the family together sharing the same interest
• It is a topic of conversation afterwards

Excitement Appeal

• I like the excitement of a close finish
• I like to forget my worries for a while
• I like trying to guess the winner
• Having got the answer right I feel really good
• I get involved in the competition

Educational Appeal

• I find I know more than I thought
• I find I have improved myself
• I feel respect for the people on the program
• I think over some of the questions afterwards
• It's educational

Advantage of U & G model:

1. No longer saw audiences as passive.
2. Opens the door for a much bigger concept: understanding the influence of ideology.

Criticisms of U & G model:

1. Retrospective Self-Reporting
2. Reliance on Rational Choice-Making
3. Individualistic and Psychologistic
4. What about Effects?